Month: April 2005

The 4th Green

Nick MomrikLeave a comment

Green Jacket. Every golfer wants one, but few ever get one. Today Tiger Woods won his 4th by winning the 2005 Masters at Augusta National.

Tiger started Sunday at the Masters down by 4 strokes with 27 holes left to play. Woods birdied the first 4 holes of the morning to make it 7 in a row going back to Saturday and found himself with a 2 stroke lead over Chris DiMarco. The #1 golfer in the world turned a 4 shot deficit into a 2 stroke advantage in just 4 holes. Yes, with the win, he also took over the #1 ranking as the world’s top golfer. Maybe winning his 9th major championship will silence the critics and prove that his swing changes have been worth it.

I watched all five hours of television coverage today and it was the greatest golf tournament I’ve ever watched. DiMarco and Woods went back and forth for 18 holes and both ended up at -12. When Tiger chipped in for birdie on 16 I jumped out of my chair and went nuts. It looked as if he was going to bogey the hole with DiMarco in good position for birdie and a possible chance at taking the lead, but instead Tiger pushed his lead to two. Woods nearly gave the tournament away by shooting bogey on the final two holes, but came through with a birdie on the first playoff hole for a win.

It was a great competition to watch and seeing Phil Mickelson slip that green jacket onto Tiger’s shoulders during the traditional ceremony in the Butler Cabin was sweet. Phil was wearing his traditional fake smile and I can only imagine what was running through Tiger’s mind at the moment. After all, it’s no secret the two aren’t the best of friends.

Tournament Mistakes

Aside Nick MomrikLeave a comment

I don’t feel like going through hand histories from Friday night’s 9th place finish so there won’t be any tournament recap. There wasn’t much interesting content anyway. I had a few paragraphs typed up for a post about tournament mistakes but have deleted it. I didn’t like the way the words were coming out.

A Final Table

Nick Momrik2 Comments

After clearing the reload bonus on Empire Poker tonight I noticed a $10,000 guaranteed tournament with very few people signed up. It was $75+7 and since Empire had just given me $150 in free money I said what the hell and signed up. When the tournament started 120 people has signed up, so Empire had to add $1000 of their own cash to the prize pool. Sweet! The top 20 places paid, so my first focus was on making the money, but I made it all the way up to 9th before making a bonehead mistake. 9th place paid $300 for a nice $218 profit. It’s late and I have a lot to get done in the morning before heading off to the casino, so a tournament recap will just have to wait.

9th Place

Apple Carts

Nick Momrik7 Comments

Recently I’ve been thinking about buying a Mac. An apple a day keeps the doctor away…right? Below are the prices I’ve come up with for a 15 inch PowerBook, 17 inch PowerBook, and Mac Mini. I’d much rather have a laptop, because I already have desktop with my Dell server. $2,500 is a lot of money though! One benefit is that I’ll be able to write the purchase off on taxes, so in reality the cost is about 25% less when it comes down to it.

Apple Carts

What do you think?

Making Progress

Nick Momrik1 Comment

Or am I?

On Tuesday night I finally cleared the 2250 raked hands for the MultiPoker signup bonus. It took me a week. Ridiculous! I’m definitely not taking advantage of the reload bonus they’re running right now. 20x raked hands. That’ll take forever. Tuesday was one of those nights where you wonder how you don’t lose your whole bankroll. I couldn’t get a hand to hold up. Big slick only flopped top pair once out of 8 times. Mrs. Slick did it one out of four. Cowboys were 0-2 as were the ladies. I played for a about three hours or so. Finally around midnight I cleared the bonus and cashed out. Considering how my good starting hands performed, I was glad to only lose 20 big bets for the session. During my stay at MultiPoker I finished $0.04 ahead. Woohoo!! I was up over 70 BB about halfway through the bonus clearing, but went a little downhill from there.

Read More »

Spring is Here

Nick Momrik1 Comment

Monday – Went biking and watched the NCAA Championship game with friends.

Tuesday – Went golfing for the first time this year. It’s the earliest I’ve ever golfed in a season.

Wednesday – Went out to eat at Hooter’s with friends.

Spring is definitely here and I love it. It’s my favorite season of the year. The weather is perfect for outdoor activities.

Magical Madness

Nick Momrik1 Comment

Last night #2 North Carolina beat top ranked Illinois 75-70 in the NCAA Championship game. UNC led by 13 at half and was up by as much as 15 in the 2nd half, but Illinois fought back to make for an exciting finish to the best March Madness in history.

Words can’t even describe how special it was watching college kids battle on the basketball court for the past three weeks. There’s nothing in sports quite like it. Every kid that plays basketball dreams about cutting down the nets someday. Very few will ever get the opportunity to make those dreams a reality. Each year in March we get to watch how much it really means to these kids. They aren’t playing for money or fame. They’re playing with heart, emotion, and lifelong goals as their motivation.

I won’t even go into it anymore than I have, because you either understand what I’m saying or you don’t. It really is a joy to watch.